


Shenanigans: Where The Lightning Splits The Sea Edition

by aparticularbandit



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Jane the Virgin (TV), The Tick (TV 2017)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Harry Potter Setting, F/F, Gen, Other, and this is not the main fic but more scenes that don't really fit in the main fic, expect some of the tags to probably change later, isn't posted yet, some of these tags are for characters who show up later, which
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-05-03
Updated: 2019-05-03
Packaged: 2020-02-16 11:29:01
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,862
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18690583
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aparticularbandit/pseuds/aparticularbandit
Summary: A collection of one-shots for the Where The Lightning Splits The Sea universe, primarily scenes that do not fit into the main work itself, although there may be others.





	Shenanigans: Where The Lightning Splits The Sea Edition

**Author's Note:**

> I know I haven't started posting the main fic itself yet (and the title given is for the series, not for the individual books), but I had this scene done and wanted to post something and felt this would give you a sort of taste of what the fic may look like when it's posted!
> 
> And while you primarily have Janet in this chapter (Janet being Ms. Lint), Clara and Elena do both have cameos at the end, which is nice. ^^
> 
> Also don't judge me for the chapter title I just really wanted to use that.

There weren’t many orphans on Janet’s first trip to Diagon Alley.  She was one of two her age, and then there were maybe five others total of varying ages.  A couple of the older students thought it would be nice to try and mentor her and the other girl her age, and while Lucy seemed to eat the attention up, Janet only pulled deeper into herself.  It wasn’t that she didn’t like people, more that she wasn’t going to give such instant access into her life to people she’d only just met.  _That_ was _foolish_.

And Janet, although a lot of other things, wasn’t foolish.

The older students scattered once they reached Diagon Alley, and Lucy left with the two who’d decided to show her around, which left Janet with the wizard guardian who’d been elected to gather them up and bring them here.  She looked up at the man with the greasy black hair and the hooked nose and blinked a couple of times, waiting for some sort of guidance.  When none was given, she pulled out her list of school supplies, skimming through it again, then pulled on the man’s thick black robes.  He looked down almost at once, and as soon as she had his attention, she said, “Take me to the wands.”

One of the man’s eyebrows raised.  He didn’t say much, hadn’t said much of anything on the way there other than to try and get the two trouble-makers to calm down, threatening them with…taking points from…something Janet didn’t understand.  Probably something that had to do with the wizarding school she was meant to be going to later this year.  Without any further prompting, the man stalked into the alley, and she followed him until they stopped in front of a shop called _Ollivander’s_.

“This is where you will get your wand,” the hooked nose man said.  “I will wait outside.”  He sounded almost bored.

Well, of course he did.  It wasn’t as though he had any attachments to any of them.  He probably didn’t even do this every year, just this one, and the small number of new students was probably disappointing to him.

Janet didn’t think much on it as she entered the wand shop.  If anything, she was considering her tomcat named Cat, the stray she’d left at the orphanage while she shopped but intended to bring with her to Hogwarts, and the threats she’d given the other orphans if they so much as laid a finger on him.  She hadn’t needed to make the threats after the electrifying outburst she’d given the last time, but it seemed better to her to make sure they heard it loud and clear so there wouldn’t be any questioning what she’d do to them – or that she _would_ do anything to them – if Cat was harmed when she returned.

A bell tinkled overhead as she opened the door to Ollivander’s, and a man who seemed so old that she thought she could see through his paper-thin skin came from behind the counter to greet her.  “Ah, it must be the right day, mustn’t it?” he asked, and although he didn’t specify, Janet knew what he meant.

Orphans.  All of them.  Coming to his shop in droves.  It must be _orphan day_.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”  Her eyes roamed the countless black boxes coating the walls, in stacks on the floor, covering every surface of the shop save for one rickety old chair in the front corner.  She wondered why the hooked nose man didn’t come inside and sit there to wait, but it didn’t really matter.  “I’m here for a wand.”

“Of course you are.”

His words sat uncomfortably beneath her skin, like a hair growing the wrong way or a piece of chicken stuck between her teeth, one that she couldn’t pick and pry out between shorn nails.  _Of course._   She reached out towards the boxes, not even asking before running her fingers along them, leaving tracks in the dust coating their sides.  There was power in them, or maybe it was power in her – whatever lay inside them quaked as she brushed across them.

Janet turned back only to see the old man watching her as she moved.  Or, no, he wasn’t watching _her_ – he was watching the boxes.  “I won’t hurt them,” she said, pulling her hand back.  “I was just curious.”  Her eyes returned to the shelves of boxes in front of her.  “How do I know which one?”

“You don’t,” the man whispered.  “The wand chooses the wizard.”

“All these wands, and we try them on like shoes until one fits?”  Only there wasn’t any indication of shoe size or type.  Just countless boxes.  She could be here all day!  But she had other shopping to do for school!  She knew the hooked nosed man outside wouldn’t wait forever for her.  Even now, she could feel his boredom increasing, and she resisted the urge to look through the window at him where he still stood outside.  The volunteers at the orphanage did the same thing when they took the orphans out once a month, stood outside the shops and tapped their feet and crossed their arms, everything that said they wanted them to hurry because they had other things to do with their time than babysit children who couldn’t buy anything even if they wanted.

Janet stole grubby handfuls of candy sometimes and she always got away with it.  Maybe that was magic, too.  She’d suck on a long sugar pop while the other kids were asleep and after one of the kids spent hours crying, they sometimes found a piece under their pillow the next day.  They said Santa came early.  But Janet knew better.  Even at eleven, she knew there wasn’t any Santa Claus.  Just people who pretended.

“Something like that.”

There was a rustling sound behind her, and Janet turned to see the man moving a few boxes to the side.  He had to have a method of some sort, because after going through the piles, he pulled one box out, opened it, and handed the wand over to her.  “Try this one.  Cedar, unicorn tail hair, 10 ¼ inches.”

Janet took hold of the wand, but before she could say anything, the man was snatching the wand back through her fingers, murmuring, “No, no, no, wrong, _very_ wrong,” and going back further into his shelves of boxes.  She wanted to ask him just _what_ was wrong and how he knew what it was.  She hadn’t felt anything at all.  Her gaze drifted to her now dust-covered fingers and she wondered if, perhaps, the dust was getting in the way of whatever it is the wand was supposed to have done.

When he came back with another box and another wand, Janet wiped her hands on her pants – her favorite article of clothing, considering the orphanage wanted most of their girls in nice skirts and most of those were covered in plaid or florals – and took it without quite registering the qualifying terms he was giving it – elm, dragon heartstring, 9 ¼ inches.  But again, the moment her fingers barely touched the wood, the wand was ripped from her hands and placed back into the box with that same “No, no, no, _wrong_.”

Janet stared at her hands.  She flexed her fingers.  There’d been power in the boxes, or there’d been power in her.  She’d _seen_ her power, manifested on the boys who’d dared to hurt Cat.  A few of them were still in the hospital, one of them with glassy eyes and another muttering a string of unintelligible words, _gibberish_.  She imagined the lightning flickering through her fingers again and how powerful it made her feel, and she almost, _almost_ thought she saw the tiniest spark again.

This time, when the shopkeeper came back with another wand, a spark flicked backwards onto her fingertips.

“ _Ow_.”

Her voice was barely above a whisper, but this time, the wand was left in her hands.  Janet ran back through the titles he’d given it – ebony, unicorn tail hair, 11 ½ inches – as though something in those would give her some insight into why _this_ wand was left in her hands.  Surely this one couldn’t be hers.  It shocked her!  She didn’t want a wand that was going to bite her every time she touched it!

The shopkeeper’s voice was equally soft as he turned from Janet, almost in a trance, “Of course.  Why didn’t I see it before?” and he disappeared even farther into the back of the store.  Her dark eyes followed him, and when she couldn’t see him any longer, she put the wand on the countertop next to its empty box.  It shocked her again for her trouble, and she growled at it.  Stupid wand.  She could _break it_ if she wanted!

But something told her the shopkeeper would be very upset with her for that, and she was afraid that the hooked nose man outside would take her away from the wands and the magic and throw her back in the orphanage again.  She wouldn’t get away with breaking the wand as easily as she did stealing candy from the local store.

Well, as long as the wand didn’t shock her again it would be fine.  She wouldn’t touch it, and it wouldn’t touch her.  Simple enough.

Janet waited for the shopkeeper to return, but he seemed to be lost in the back of the store.  Maybe he didn’t have any real organizational method for all of this.  No filing cabinet like in the library with cards on where the books were if she wanted to find them.  She doubted a man that old could actually remember where every wand he wanted in this shop was.  With him gone, she began to walk down the aisles of the store, following him to the back.  She flexed and unflexed her fingers before tracing through the dust on the boxes again.  She moved her fingers up and down as she walked, making a river pattern in dust that grew thicker and thicker the further back she went.

Then, all of a sudden, she stopped.

She couldn’t say just _why_ she had stopped.  It wasn’t like the feeling of the other boxes, that quaking shaking of power that didn’t feel quite right, but it was something else entirely.  Something warm.  Kind of like clothes just pulled out of the dryer, still covered in static but _warm_ until it zapped her fingertips.  But it was higher than the boxes she’d been brushing her fingers against, and when she looked up, she could see it just above her and out of reach.  There wasn’t anything different or special about the box.  Maybe more layers of dust than the other ones, hidden so far back that it might as well not have existed.

Janet dragged a stepstool over and climbed up until she was on the right level.  Then she started going through the boxes.

It wasn’t in the front, so maybe she _hadn’t_ really been able to see it.  She had to move stacks of boxes over and put them down on the ground until she could get to it, and when she found it, the box wasn’t a deep black like the other ones but a mottled gray.  It was beat up and bent, and the box seemed to be suffering from water damage.  A leak in the ceiling, maybe, or one of the other wands didn’t like it.  She bent forward, dangling over the edge of the shelf and kicking until she could just barely reach it with the tips of her fingertips.

The box seemed to hum with delight when she touched it, a soundless vibration which only increased as she grabbed it with one hand and then fell back with a loud clatter, crashing into the stacks of boxes she’d so carefully placed on the other side of the aisle.  Janet struggled to unearth herself and looked around, but the shopkeeper still seemed to be far away in the back of the store.  She could hear pounding as she stood up and brushed herself off, one hand holding tight to the box she’d grabbed, but she didn’t  know if that was the sound of footsteps running towards her or her own heartbeat.

She opened the box and reached inside, fingertips brushing the wand inside.  It felt warm as she grasped it, and when she pulled it out, sparks like lightning were dancing around her hand where she held it.  The light flickered in her eyes.  She grinned.

* * *

 

When the shopkeeper finally returned with a handful of boxes in his hands, the mess Janet had made was all cleaned up.  The stacks she’d moved were back neatly where she’d taken them from, even if they weren’t in the same order they’d been in before.  She sat with the box in her lap, the wand balanced between her fingers, little legs swinging where they could barely touch the floor, leaving long lines in the dust on the ground.

“I don’t need those,” Janet said.  Her eyes never left the wand in her hand.  “This one is mine.”

“Interesting,” the shopkeeper said as the bell tingled overhead.  His eyes flicked to the door, but no one entered yet.  There was a woman standing there with her fingers wrapped around the door, holding it open as she talked with the hooked nosed man still waiting for Janet outside.

The shopkeeper’s gaze returned to Janet.  “Pine, thunderbird feather, 13 ½ inches.  _Unyielding._ ”

“I don’t know what any of that means.”

“A colleague of mine sent me materials from America years ago.  They didn’t work well with most of the young witches and wizards here, and while they were certainly powerful, they could be temperamental.  Particular.  I thought I’d sent them all back to my colleague, all of the wands I’d made, but apparently,” and here his eyes returned to the wand, “I didn’t.”

“How much is it?”

Janet didn’t have much money on her.  She’d been given a little bit on the way here by the hooked nosed man, and the fact that this was such a rare wand meant that it probably cost more than the others did.  It felt _right_ , perfect, like an extension of her entire being, and she’d definitely part with the entire amount she had just for it, but she didn’t think they’d look kindly on that.

“Take it,” the man said, his voice very soft.  “It shouldn’t be here anymore, and if you’ve found it, then it was destined to be yours.”

“I can just…have this?” Janet whispered.  She looked at the wand in her fingertips, but she didn’t grin.  “You won’t just give it to me for nothing.  No one does that, unless I’m stealing it.  What do you want for it?”

The man smiled.  “Come here.”

Janet hopped off the seat and walked forward, the wand tight in her hand now, no longer balanced between her fingers.  She held up her tiny bag of money and gave it to him, even though he didn’t ask for it.  The man opened the bag and pushed his fingers through the gold, silver, and bronze coins inside.  He took out one, extremely tarnished, bronze coin and held it up before his eyes, peering at it.  “This one,” he said finally.  “It’s more than enough for that wand.”

This time, Janet didn’t grin.  Her smile was less childish excitement and more smug.  She’d paid, and now it was hers, rightfully hers, and no one else could have it.  _Her_ wand.  She snatched the bag with the rest of her money from the counter just as the bell overhead tingled once more.  She didn’t pay the woman any mind as she pushed past her, barely acknowledging the girl with tangled red corkscrew hair who watched her with wide blue eyes, didn’t look back as the woman pushed the girl inside the wand shop.  Instead, she came to an abrupt stop in front of the hooked nosed man and looked up at him with dark hazel eyes.

“I’ve got my wand.”

“So you have,” he said, his voice deep but not menacing.  He did not ask after the wand, and she did not ask after his, as she’d been prepared to do if he’d so much as started the question.  Somehow, this felt private to her.  Like something she should keep to herself and not share with anyone.

Janet stood looking up at the man for a few minutes, one hand tight on her bag of coins and the other tight on her wand.  She shoved the bag into one pocket and pulled out her letter again, reading through for supplies.  Too many in so many places she didn’t know what or where.  But she had a wand, and she had a guide, and if the other shopkeepers weren’t as understanding and kind as that one was, well…she didn’t have much but she’d figure something out.

So she looked back up to the hooked nose man, her dark eyes meeting his darker ones.

“Where do we go next?”

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading and please do leave comments or something to give me some idea of what you think of this so far, even if it is an individual scene that's mostly a tie-in. Whether the characterization works so far, that sort of thing, what you hope to see from what's coming. Just. Thoughts!


End file.
